


Knife & Tie

by murderofonerose (atmilliways)



Series: Dethklok Drabbles-a-Roonie-Doonie [8]
Category: Metalocalypse (Cartoon)
Genre: Fake/Pretend Relationship, Just for a minute but it COUNTS, M/M, Pre-Canon, kind of a meet-cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-24 06:07:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,124
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30067809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atmilliways/pseuds/murderofonerose
Summary: A collection of short stories that feature Magnus and Charles squaring off, so to speak.
Relationships: Magnus Hammersmith/Charles Foster Offdensen
Series: Dethklok Drabbles-a-Roonie-Doonie [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1125033
Comments: 1
Kudos: 6





	Knife & Tie

**Author's Note:**

> Happy birthday, Will! I hope you like my first attempt with this pairing.

It was a jolt, seeing someone he hadn’t quite decided what to think about yet at a random dive bar. And being seen in return. Weird to run into the band’s new manager, who seemed like a total square, in a social setting—like running into a teacher at the grocery store. But before Magnus knew what was happening, the man was waving him over with every indication that he was quite pleased to see him and calling, “Magnus! Over here!” 

Not that he could hear him over the music and other general noise, but he could read lips well enough to tell that’s what he was saying.

Bemused, Magnus made his way across the bar. The crowd jostled him the whole way, and pushed him a lot closer to Offdensen than he’d meant to get, nearly knocking over the man and his barstool, but this didn’t seem to present a problem. In fact, Charles threw an arm around Magnus’ neck in greeting and leaned in and hissed urgently in his ear: “ _Please_ help me, I’ve been trying to get rid of this woman for _half an hour_.” 

He smelled very faintly of alcohol, but not enough to explain the presumptuous familiarity of the hug. Magnus glanced over Offdensen’s shoulder at the fake blonde with ample cleavage whose expression was somewhere in flux between smugly seductive and startled disappointment, and realized what the man was talking about. She looked like the kind of girl that he himself seldom had the energy for. There was a weird level of performance, of showmanship, that they always seemed to demand, like they were trying to live out some sort of porno or something. It was exhausting. 

So he could sympathize. Not exactly something he did often, but why not help the guy out? He’d already spent all his cash on drinks and smokes for the night, so it wasn’t like he had anything better to do. 

Smirking, Magnus looped one arm around the man’s waist. “There you are, babe,” he said loudly and with exaggerated enthusiasm. “Miss me?” 

He made direct eye contact with the woman, who looked about to object, before grabbing Offdensen’s ass—surprisingly firm under the suit, for a glorified desk jockey—and tugging him forward against his chest and into a quick peck on the lips. With his free hand he flipped the woman off, and watched in amusement as she flitted away, red faced. 

“There,” he said to Offdensen, dropping back into his usual sardonic tones as he released the man, “you’re clear. She won’t be back.”

“Yes, I can see that,” Offdensen replied, raising an eyebrow high above his thick black frames. “Very, ah, effective of you. I was, ah, thinking more along the lines of you faking an emergency that I had to rush off to attend to, but, ah . . . that works too.”

If there was one thing Magnus hated it was not being appreciated, and, well. He’d solved the problem, but wasn’t exactly being thanked profusely for it, and that rankled. Plus, kissing the new manager on the mouth, before he’d even gotten the band signed with a label? Stupid, cocky, impulsive, and the guys would be pissed if he got them dropped right after they’d signed all the damn paperwork the guy had given them. Suddenly he was hyper aware of everywhere on his mostly bare chest (because fuck shirt buttons, those were the _worst_ ) Offdensen had bumped into a moment ago, and he did _not_ appreciate the heat he felt rising in his own face. 

“Hey, fuck you man,” he snapped. “I helped you out, now you owe me a drink.” Scowling, he dropped onto the woman’s recently vacated bar stool. “What are you doing in a place like this anyway, and not curled up in bed with a nice law book and a cup of fuckin’ . . . hot cocoa or something?”

Offdensen took his seat, shrugging and signaling to the bartender in one practiced motion. “I’ve been, ah, coming to this establishment since 1982. The decor and ambiance have changed, but a liquor license is still a liquor license.” He accepted two glasses as they were slid across the bar and passed one to Magnus with a nod. “Why should I stop coming if I was here first?” 

“Yeah, well.” Magnus sipped experimentally, and found that it was a surprisingly mellow, complex brandy—nothing like the harsh rotgut and happy hour well drinks that were all he could usually afford. This, he found himself actually bothering to taste as it went down. “. . . Hire some muscle next time if you want protection from the horny and the restless, ‘cause I won’t always just happen to be around to sweep in and fucking rescue you.” 

“I _am_ paying you in drink,” Offdensen pointed out. But Magnus happened to be watching out of the corner of his eye and saw a flicker of something behind the spectacles, and wondered. 

He was kind of surprised Offdensen even knew his first name, especially considering they’d never really had a one on one conversation before. Sure, it was on the paperwork he’d signed along with the guys, but that was only if Offdensen could decipher his shitty handwriting, 

“And not that I anticipated needing it,” Charles continued, looking at a point somewhere over Magnus’ left shoulder, “but I’m sure your muscle would have been capable enough, should it have become, ah, necessary. According to your, ah, arrest records.” 

. . . Or maybe Offdensen was just the kind of guy who did his research. Bean counters could be like that, always going into the nitty gritty details—like the number of bar fights Magnus tended to get into on a regular basis. And the fifty-fifty split of what kinds of bars those were. 

Magnus put his drink down with a suspicious squint. _Wait a minute. . . ._ “You were the one who hugged me,” he accused. “That wasn’t fishing for a fake emergency, you were totally trying to get me to pretend—Admit it!” 

He was annoyed now, but not very. It was kind of funny, actually; Offdensen trying to pretend no homo just to keep the conversation as bland and impersonal as possible. Magnus had been in other bands before, and he knew the hands-off, business-only types. Honestly, it was a sign that Offdensen was probably a decent manager. The bad ones would get drunk and high with their bands and end up either dropping the ball or screwing musicians over. But like, after broadcasting the equivalent of, _Help me I’m being hit on at a bar please be my fake boyfriend for a second_? Kinda fucking priceless. 

It didn’t matter what Offdensen said next. Either way, that was the moment he decided he liked the guy.


End file.
